


The Gilded Ceiling

by telepathy



Series: The Castle & The Rose [1]
Category: Beauty and the Beast (2017)
Genre: Angst, Beasts POV, Comfort, Expanded Scene, F/M, Heartache, In Beast's head, Longing, Missing Scenes, Sadness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-20
Updated: 2017-04-20
Packaged: 2018-10-21 08:29:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10681554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/telepathy/pseuds/telepathy
Summary: Beast watches Belle when she arrives, then thinks of her after she's taken her father's place as prisoner. Beast POV – Expanded scene.





	The Gilded Ceiling

I've watched her since she rode in through the gate. Hidden by the deep of all that does not move within my castle, I stalk slowly, silently. 

I follow the girl as she intrusively roams, noting the tentative steps she takes as my servants speak; she knows not whence the sound originates, but walks on despite this. She's unafraid. 

Curious. She’s…curious. 

Lumiere is within her grasp now, and he's gone static – as though he is truly nothing greater than a candelabra. 

The thief's voice echoes in the hallowed halls just then and she follows it, almost instinctively, her legs moving with shocking finesse. 

In some sections, the stone staircase is treacherous, but she pays no mind to such trivial matters. The girl leaps over perilous gaps and shies away from crumbling edges as though she has done this a thousand times. Like I have done this a thousand times. It's as though this castle and every broken detail trapped inside is familiar to her. 

She reaches the cell door and descends to her knees – "Papa! Your hands are ice..." 

So, it's her father I've captured. Intriguing. 

This daring woman is somehow related to the rose snatcher. The trespasser who ran scared from a talking teacup. _He_ is her father? Somehow I don't like thought of this. 

"Who's there? Who are you?" 

She must have heard me on the wind, growling despite my desires to remain anonymous; she calls out to the darkness that keeps me safe from view, a mixture of anxiety and fear marring her features. 

"Who're _you_?"

"I've come for my father!"

"You're father…is a thief."

"Liar!" 

"He stole a rose."

"I asked for the rose. Punish me, not him."

My prisoner squeals from behind his iron door then, an air of brazenness licking each of his words, "No, he means forever. Apparently that's what happens around here when you pick a flower!"

Her head snaps towards me, and she's gone from tentative submissiveness to outright accusation. No wonder, given her caged lineage. 

"A life sentence for a rose?"

I roar and leap across the gaping chasm, from one turret to the next, my footing and confidence sure. 

"I received eternal damnation for one. I'm merely locking him away. Now, do you still wish to take your fathers place?"

 _Why_ had I even thought to give option to such an absurd offer? Prisoners didn't exchange or switch places. They were as they were. And yet. 

"Come into the light."

No. No, she can't see me. I cannot allow this to happen. Spinning on my devilish heels, I give her my back, clad in a severed shroud of blues and blacks. I don't pay much mind to attire these past…years. 

I hear the girl retrieve Lumiere from a small stone shelf, and wastes not a moment before shoving the light directly onto my body. 

Well, if she must. 

I turn and my reveal is greeted as expected: she gasps, deeply and I see a sudden burst of fright overwhelm her. 

She's appalled. She's utterly _horrified_. And who am I to blame her? Imagine the shock, imagine my own terrible admonishment when first looking upon _this_ face. 

Enough of these games.

I lean in closer, “Choose." 

From seemingly no where, her father throws himself onto the proverbial pyre: "Belle, I won't let you do this. I lost your mother, I won't lose you, too. Now go, go!"

The man coughs a sputtering, sad spell and the girl turns away from me to comfort him. 

I watch them passively, feigning disinterest, while idly biding time. Giving them an allowance they do not deserve. 

"Alright, Papa, I'll leave." She moves away from the mortar cage and speaks from a place I haven’t had much experience with: her heart. "I need a minute alone with him." 

A growl vibrates low within the base of my throat; chuffing, I turn away from a combination of her brash arrogance and my insufferable impatience. 

"Are you so cold-hearted that you won't allow a daughter to kiss her father goodbye?"

I ignore the desperate plea, hardening my heart against the wash of unforeseen, creeping emotions. But I don’t owe her a thing…

"Forever can spare a minute."

Oh, now she's gone poetic and weepy, destroying any ground she might have temporarily won over on me. 

Turning, I move towards her, the light of Lumiere shining brightly against the scowl I almost always wear. I pull the lever and the prisoners door swings open to a symphony of aged metal. "When this door closes, it will not open again."

The next moment or so goes by quickly, and I’m not entirely certain as to the full accuracies; she’s tricked her father it seems, as she’s replaced him. She stands behind the barred door to _her_ cell now.

Her father lays at my feet, his mind undoubtedly attempting to understand what she’s just done, but he’s feeble and ill. I step beyond him and thrust my face towards her, “You took his place.” 

“He’s my father.” 

“He’s a fool. **And so are you.** ” 

I cut away from the girl, the prisoner, and pull her father up onto my shoulder; I descend the tower, listening to the man’s empty promises of returning and her pleas that I don’t hurt him. He doesn’t fight or struggle and a part of me can’t help but wonder…why? Why would he not try _anything_ to get from me to save her, to free his one and only daughter? 

I suppose he’s smarter than I originally suspected, or perhaps far weaker than he looks. Either way, he’s leaving, and she’s staying. 

“Don’t hurt her, please, I beg of you. Do not harm my daughter!” 

I remain silent but inside I’m utterly alight with noise and emotion; _hurt her?_ Despite appearances and yes, my general disposition, I’m not in the mind to suffer the agony of any one girl, or inflict any upon her. 

“Please, please! You don’t have to hurt her.”

Finally outside and free from the turret, I languish the man before shoving him against a cursed, arachnid-like carriage, “She’s just a girl, I’d never harm her. But she will never escape, she will never leave this place.” 

I toss the frightened stealer into the rear of the strange transport and secure the latch, effectively locking him in the belly of another beast. I don’t wait nor watch them go, as somehow, I trust he will end up exactly where I’ve intended – back in his poverty-stricken town, amongst his fellow thieves and scoundrels. 

Snow begins to fall around me, on top of me, and I look skyward towards her tower; it must be cold there for a human girl, one ill-prepared for the situation she’s now found herself a part of. I think to offer her a fresh bale of hay or cotton but then recall that no, she’s not like me, or rather I am not like her anymore. 

Shaking my head, I return through the grand entrance and ascend the western staircase. I hear her calling, shouting for her father still, the sounds echoing the halls with an unusual familiarity. 

I think to go to her, to watch her from the shadows still, but my intent isn’t quite clear – am I curious? Or pulled by the lure of change she has so suddenly brought to my life? 

Perhaps both. 

The yells cease just then and I suspect it has something to do with Lumiere, who had been forgotten and eerily motionless on the shelf the entire time. There’s little doubt he’s up to no good, but I can’t be bothered. Not now anyway. 

I resume the path to my lonely tower, and arrive without thinking; pushing through a pair of doors that encase all I hold dear, I sigh, pretenses fading away with every step. Still, inside of this room there’s the wicked rose, the cursed mirror, and painted portraits of my mother. But there’s also an ease amidst the turmoil that I cannot name, a feeling much more akin to being home than the vocal emissions of my beautiful prisoner. 

I resign myself and quietly settle into a bed of ruined wood; surrounded by shears of tattered, torn fabrics and bits of strewn hay, it feels completely normal, usual. I’m used to this. I’m certainly not okay with it but _more_ okay than I am with that girl here. 

I wonder what she’s thinking, what she’s feeling. I felt a fire within burning, and I know she will attempt to escape. But at what cost? And when? 

I can’t concern myself with that or – Belle? – for now. I’m exhausted and my desires to forget the rose thief and his progeny are of utmost import. 

I close my eyes but she’s already there, all pulled-brow and pure anger, waving the candelabra as though it were hers. There’s also fear and hesitancy to her but not much, at least not nearly what I had always expected one might have with me. 

She’s the second outsider to come here in ten years. I cannot expect her to be the one to see me through this curse, but my mind considers it. Despite every effort, stopping those thoughts seems a futile and impossible feat. Sleep should help. 

But sleep does not come. 

I growl and roll onto my back, training my eyes onto the gilded ceiling. I lift a hand and extend my wretched claw towards it, distractedly tracing the cracks between what were once sublime murals. 

A hand? No, it’s a _paw_. It’s then I know she’ll never see me as anything other than the monster I truly am. I roar, loud and true and without abandon. 

This is my life for evermore.

**Author's Note:**

> So sorry this one took long to post! Needed to nail the dialogue and nuances so had to wait for a few things for the sake of accuracy! More coming. Thanks for all the likes, comments & kudos for my tiny series of vignettes! x


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